Will The Recording Industry Sue Edgar Bronfman For Downloading?

Say That Again

from the just-asking dept

Edgar Bronfman Jr., back in 2000 was one of the first record label execs (he headed Seagrams, which at the time owned Universal) to come up with the idea of suing Napster and all its users. Since he was eventually forced out, and later had to buy Warner Music to get back into the business, the idea that he kicked off has certainly taken hold with thousands upon thousands of lawsuits filed by the RIAA. All too often, we’ve heard about cases where the RIAA would claim that whoever owned the broadband account where file sharing occurred was liable for any infringement. That allowed them to sue parents who had done absolutely nothing wrong, and claim that they were still responsible for the actions of their kids who may have been sharing unauthorized files. Given all that, it’s interesting to note that Edgar Bronfman Jr. is now admitting that his kids have been downloading unauthorized content. Well, actually, it’s not entirely clear. He says, “I’m fairly certain that they have, and I’m fairly certain that they’ve suffered the consequences.” He then declines to explain what those consequences are — but we’d assume it doesn’t involve huge fines, being told to drop out of school or any other such nastiness that the RIAA reserves for all those other families they’re suing. However, if the RIAA really believes that parents are liable for the actions of their kids, and Bronfman has just admitted that his kids have been file sharing, shouldn’t they slap one of their famed extortion letters on him? He can certainly afford it. Thanks only to Skype’s wealthy founders bailing Kazaa out of a lawsuit by paying $100 million to record labels, Warner Music actually turned a profit last quarter. Without the Kazaa money, however, they’d continue the company’s trend of losing cash every which way — but apparently it hasn’t occurred to them that their legal strategy isn’t helping business very much.